Delightful Obsolete Words It’s High Time We Revived

From Buzzfeed (probably not the most scientific site on the web, but this is a great article)
Callipygian and Resistentialism are my favourites!

1. GROAK

Meaning: To silently watch someone while they are eating, hoping to be invited to join them.

Origin: Unknown
As in: It’s hard to enjoy your meal when the guy opposite is groaking you the whole time.

2. HUGGER-MUGGER

Meaning: To act in a secretive manner.
Origin: 1530s
As in: I’m sick of all these sneaky types, creeping around and hugger-muggering the whole time.

3. CRAPULOUS

Meaning: To feel ill because of excessive eating/drinking.
Origin: 1530s
As in: Blerg. The morning after St. Patrick’s Day. I feel crapulous.

4. SNOWBROTH
Meaning: Freshly melted snow.
Origin: 1590s
As in: Yesterday we woke up to a perfect carpet of white, but now it’s just snowbroth. :-(
 

5. JARGOGLE Meaning: To confuse, bamboozle.
Origin: 1690s
As in: I don’t get string theory. It utterly jargogles my brain.

6. APRICITY
Meaning: The sun’s warmth on a cold winter’s day.
Origin: 1620s
As in: Even in darkest December you sometimes get a moment of beautiful apricity.

7. TWATTLE
Meaning: To gossip, or talk idly.
Origin: 1600s
As in: I wish you’d quit twattling and get on with your work.

8. GORGONIZE

Meaning: To have a paralyzing or mesmerizing effect on someone.
Origin: Early 17th century
As in: Don’t look into his eyes. He’s so charismatic, you’ll be gorgonized.

9. COCKALORUM
Meaning: A little man with a high opinion of himself.
Origin: 1710s
As in: He’s a boastful shortarse. Total cockalorum.

10. SNOUTFAIR
Meaning: A good-looking person.
Origin: 1500s
As in: Alison Brie? Total snoutfair.

11. JOLLUX
Meaning: Slang term for a fat person.
Origin: 1780s
As in: Time to go on a diet, I’m getting to be a right jollux.

12. CURGLAFF
Meaning: The shock one feels upon first plunging into cold water.
Origin: Scots, 1800s
As in: Those outdoor swimmers must have balls of steel to cope with that kind of curglaff.

13. BRABBLE
Meaning: To argue loudly about something inconsequential.
Origin: 1530s
As in: I can’t stand Question Time, it always descends into brabbling.

14. LUNTING
Meaning: Walking while smoking a pipe.
Origin: 1820s
As in: I’m off for a post-lunch lunt, anyone care to join me?

15. CALLIPYGIAN
Meaning: Having beautifully shaped buttocks.
Origin: 1640s
As in: I admire Beyoncé for her musical talent. The fact she is highly callipygian is neither here nor there.

16. RESISTENTIALISM
Meaning: The seemingly malevolent behaviour displayed by inanimate objects.
Origin: 1940s
As in: That water bottle looks like it wants to kill me. It exhibits resistentialism.

17. CURMURING
Meaning: A low rumbling sound produced by the bowels.
Origin: 1880s
As in: Nothing worse than audibly curmuring during a job interview.

"Languages are like towns: they must grow organically and for good reason. Esperanto is like a new town, Telfor or Milton Keynes; it has linguistically speaking, ample walkways, spacious parking, rational traffic flow and all the modern amenities: but there are no historic sides, no great towering landmarks: there is no feeling that mankind has grown and lived and worked here, shaping the architecture according to neccessity, power or worship.

The English language, however, is like York or Chester or Norwich or London - absurd narrow twisting streets that strangers are so lost in, no parking, no velodrome: but there are churches, castles, custom houses, the remnants of old slums, and old palaces. Our past is there. But not just our past, these cities are not museums, they contain the present too: estates, office blocks, contraflow cycle paths. They are living things, towns and languages."

- Stephen Fry, 'Trefusius Is Unwell', Paperweight

Dunkel war's, der Mond schien helle

My dad recently reminded me of this poem, which I used to love when I was a kid. Unfortunately, there's no real English translation, so I will probably try to translate it - but be warned; it won't be half as good in English as it is in German, because this poem lives through its paradoxes, some of which are really hard to translate into English (especially if I attempt to keep the rhythm of it, which I'm not sure I will - let me direct you to this post about the problems of translating).
The author of the poem is unknown, and one great thing about it is that it has evolved throughout time. The earliest known version is from the 19th century (according to wikipedia) and since then, stanzas have been added or words changed (for example Wagen (coach) is now sometimes Auto (car)). Nowadays there are versions with sixteen stanzas! However, I will only post the first four stanzas, as they are the ones that are normally kept fairly the same, probably because this is the 'most famous' version as children's author James Krüss used it in the 1960s I believe. So, until I have completed the translation (if I ever will), here's the German one for those of you able to understand it:

Dunkel war’s, der Mond schien helle,
schneebedeckt die grüne Flur,
als ein Wagen blitzeschnelle,
langsam um die Ecke fuhr.

Drinnen saßen stehend Leute,
schweigend ins Gespräch vertieft,
Als ein totgeschoss’ner Hase
Auf der Sandbank Schlittschuh lief.

Und ein blondgelockter Jüngling
mit kohlrabenschwarzem Haar
saß auf einer grünen Kiste,
die rot angestrichen war.

Neben ihm ’ne alte Schrulle,
zählte kaum erst sechzehn Jahr,
in der Hand ’ne Butterstulle,
die mit Schmalz bestrichen war.

18 Weird German Words You Won’t Believe Exist

...unless you're German, of course. Taken from this article. I must say, there are a few words I've never heard of or used, so I'm only posting the ones I know and use. In cases like this, being fluent in two languages really is a lot of fun!

1. Ohrwurm (Ear worm)

Have you ever listened to a song on the radio while driving to work only to find yourself still humming the same tune by lunch time? Congratulations, you’ve had an ear worm. The beautiful German word Ohrwurm describes the fact of having a song stuck in your head as if it wriggled itself into your brain through your ear.

2. Fernweh (Distance pain)

This gem describes the feeling of wanting to be somewhere else. It’s kind of like a reverse homesickness (Heimweh in German), a longing for a place that isn’t where you are right now. Fernweh is also a frequent reason for people in Germany to go on holiday.

3. Kummerspeck (Grief bacon)

When a relationship ends or during other times of sadness, anger, or worry, it’s common to put on a few pounds of Kummerspeck. What it means is the excess weight put on by emotional overeating. So when you find yourself on the couch watching ”Bridget Jones’ Diary” with a tub of ice cream, you are in fact feeding your grief bacon.

4. Innerer Schweinehund (Inner pig dog)

Can’t get up in the morning to be on time for work? Too lazy to go to the gym? Homework remains undone until the last minute? Don’t worry, it’s not your fault. The blame lies with your inner pig dog. That’s the tiny voice in the back of your head which is trying to convince you to live a life of inertia and which you will have to overcome to rid yourself of Kummerspeck.

5. Fremdschämen (Exterior shame)

For those of you who cringe in phantom pain when others make a fool of themselves, this is your word. It describes the feeling of shame when seeing someone else in an uncomfortable or embarrassing situation. It’s a real thing for the more empathetic folk and has kept more than one person from watching “the Office.” the translation isn't quite accurate, as 'Fremd' means strange, alien, unpersonal, but you get the idea

6. Lebensmüde (Life tired)

This word literally means being tired of life and was used to describe the dramatic and soul-crushing emotional agony of young Romantic poets (see also Weltschmerz and Weichei). Nowadays lebensmüde is what you call your friends when they are attempting something especially stupid and possibly life threatening. Most people in fail videos on YouTube suffer from latent Lebensmüdigkeit.

7. Weltschmerz (World pain)

The world isn’t perfect. More often than not it fails to live up to what we wish it was. Weltschmerz describes the pain we feel at this discrepancy. It can be one of the main drivers for Kummerspeck.

8. Weichei (Soft egg)

No, Weichei isn’t what you order in the hotel when you want a three-minute egg for breakfast. In fact the waiter might look at you slightly disconcerted for accusing him of being a wuss. A soft egg, in German, means someone who is weak and cowardly. The same is also conveyed by calling someone Würstchen, the diminutive of sausage. Apparently Germans like to name wimps after foodstuffs.

9. Erklärungsnot (Explanation poverty)

Erklärungsnot is a state shared by cheating spouses, lying politicians, and school children without their homework alike. It’s what you find yourself in when put on the spot without a sufficient explanation or excuse for something you have done or failed to do. Most often used in the form of in Erklärungsnot geraten or in Erklärungsnot sein. 'Not' is more like 'need' or even 'crisis/emergency', but again, you get the gist

10. Sitzfleisch (Sit or seat meat)

As much as it sounds like it, Sitzfleisch isn’t a recipe of German Hausfrauen that involves tenderizing meat by placing it under your buttocks. Instead, it describes a character trait. Those who possess a lot of seat meat are able to sit through and weather something incredibly hard or boring. It’s like carrying your own personal cushion around with you. 

11. Purzelbaum (Tumble tree)

This tree is so common in Germany that every child knows it. However, if you are about to take out your big German botanical dictionary, let me stop you right there. Fespite the name, a Purzelbaum isn’t part of the kingdom of plants. Instead, it describes a somersault on the ground, a favorite way of children to get their clothes dirty.

12. Dreikäsehoch (Three cheeses high)

This sounds like it would make a great name for a pizza. However, what it describes is a person who is vertically challenged, implying they’re only as tall as three wheels of cheese placed on top of each other. Usually this label is reserved for small children, together with Zwerg or Pimpf.

13. Zungenbrecher (Tongue breaker)

While it sounds like a medieval torture instrument, the nature of the Zungenbrecher is much less gruesome. It is the German equivalent of tongue twister, a phrase that’s very hard to pronounce even for native speakers due to its sequence of letters. A very common one in German is Blaukraut bleibt Blaukraut und Brautkleid bleibt Brautkleid. Yeah, practice that for a while and say it 10 times fast. I still can't do it very fast, and not even close to 10 times

14. Kuddelmuddel (???)

I know, great final word right? Don’t even start guessing its English meaning. Kuddelmuddel describes an unstructured mess, chaos, or hodgepodge. Alternatives which are equally awesome include Tohuwabohu, Wirrwarr, Mischmasch, and Kladderadatsch. I know, some of these just sound too far-fetched to be true. Well, they are far-fetched – gathered in the distant land of Germany. If you’re still convinced I’m making up words, go ahead and look them up in the dictionary! They really do exist & I use all of them

"Obsolete Word of the Day" Blog

Just found this blog, seems worth checking out if you're interested in unusual words!

"bumwhush" is something that I need to use soon!

So many ways to die....

Nice article in the Guardian about the many expressions and euphemism we have for death / dying. I also recommend reading the comments, some nice & interesting things in there - one thing I learned was that 'dying' apparently used to be an euphemism for having an orgasm in Elizabethan times.

The danger of words

Here's -once again- Stephen Fry, talking a bit about the power of language in Nazi Germany. This is a point I find extremely interesting and disturbing - not just because I'm German, simply because I've always been aware and intrigued by the 'darker' side of language and literature, by how words can destroy or manipulate thought (see my thoughts on Orwell's Newspeak). Language can literally do everything - even lead whole nations into commiting genocide. And (although German is particularly suited for slogans and the like - a lot of harsh consonants etc) it can happen to all of us. You can talk someone into commiting suicide - or stop him from killing himself. It all depends on the words you use. And often enough, they're still beautiful words. Beautiful and powerful - and potentially very, very dangerous.

"Sticks and stones may break my bones, but words will make me go in a conrner and cry by myself for hours"

Eric Idle

"Her mouth had the coldly forbidding look of the closed door of a subway express when you have just missed the train"

- P.G. Wodehouse

The Man Who Was Thursday

I must admit I probably would never have come across G.K. Chesterton's book if it hadn't been for the Summer School. But I'm extremely grateful that I did, because it's a fantastic book! I just read it for the 3rd time and still can't get over the brilliant surrealism. It's one of these books you can immediately imagine as a film - in my case I can see it as one of those 1960s technicolour films, but mixed with a little bit Tim Burton. Yep, it's that surreal. Maybe I should outline the plot before I go on, so that those of you who haven't read it can get at least a rough idea:

The era the story is set in isn't explicitly mentioned, but I would say it's around the Edwardian time, so early 20th century. The undercover policeman Gabriel Syme belongs to a special anti-anarchist unit of Scotland Yard. He meets the anarchistic poet Lucian Gregory and manages to infiltrate a branch of the anarchist society (which ironically only acts according to very strict and specific rules) and even to become elected as a new member of the anarchist council, which consists of the seven most powerful anarchists. They are all named after days of the week, with Sunday being the supreme leader and initiator of terrorist attacks. Syme becomes Thursday and goes to meet the council. Then a lot of things happen which I don't want to give away in case you want to read the book, but let me tell you this: Nothing is as it seems.

I knew I would like the book after I had read the first two sentences. I know, that sounds exaggerated, but let me just quote these sentences to you:

"The suburb of Saffron Park lay on the sunset side of London, as red and ragged as a cloud of sunset. It was built of a bright brick throughout; its skyline was fantastic, and even its ground plan was wild."

 I think I read those sentences three or four times before I proceeded to the next, because they're just so wonderful, bursting with alliterations, and have a great rhythm to them.
But the language is not the only great thing about this novel, mainly it's the characters, especially the seven council members. They are all too exaggerated to seem realistic, and yet you don't really question them, because the whole atmosphere of the book is rather dream-like, which always makes me think of a German play I read in school once, Kleist's The Prince of Homburg. It is also important to note that the subtitle of Chesterton's book is 'A Nightmare', which I think is spot on. The whole story really reads like a nightmare - but that doesn't mean it's not funny. It is, very very funny in fact. The humour too is mostly very surreal and at times quite pythonesque, for example in the chase scene (involving an elephant) where Sunday throws little notes out of the window of his carriage, or when Syme and the Professor invent a finger-tapping language to have secret conversations and start tapping out the most ridiculous long sentences.

There's a lot of debate going on about whether Chesterton was trying to convey a deeper meaning (one cannot deny that Sunday is portrayed very much like Christ or God), or whether he just wanted to write a cool, funny, weird book (which he certainly did). In the preface to his book, a poem to his childhood friend Edmund Clerihew Bentley (who invented the clerihew), Chesterton says, speaking about their childhood experiences together:

"This is a tale of those old fears, even of those emptied hells/  And none but you shall understand the true thing that it tells - / Of what colossal gods of shame could cow men yet crash, / Of what huge devils hid the stars, yet fell at a pistol flash. / The doubts that were so plain to chase, so dreadful to withstand - / Oh, who shall understand but you: yea, who shall understand?"

So maybe we're not supposed to understand what this book is really about - but if you ask me, that makes it even more intriguing. Everytime I read it or think about it, there's something new to discover or to interpret differently. But at the end of the day, despite all those different interpretations and theories about it, it's just a marvellous book. And that is good enough for me.

I don't know how many times I have watched this sketch now, I have stopped counting. I can speak along to it, yet it never fails to delight me a lot. THIS is what language is for! Being creative with it, taking it to the most absurd places you could think of. And no-one can do that quite as well as, yes, you've guessed it, Stephen Fry. I think it's the fact you can hear the delight he takes in language, forming sentences etc that make it so wonderful to me. I think I might just watch it again now. And then I will start that piece about language and comedy I've been meaning to write for such a long time.

Swearing III

Soooo, I know it's been a long time since my last post, but I had quite a busy time (moving back to Germany and sulking about it). But now I'm back with the promised next part about swearing (here part one and two). Again, a lot of the 'expert's opinion' stuff is taken from Fry's Planet Word. This post will be a bit more about the psychology of swearing and less about the linguistic side. Still, I hope you enjoy it! (again warning: strong language used)

Well, swearwords are universally used. But the question is, what makes a word offensive? Apparently (well, quite obviously) those words are all taken from the semantic field of bodily fluids / disfunctions, intimate actions or body parts. Steven Pinker, the famous linguist and cognitive scientist states the rather obvious when he says that the areas we get our swearwords from are often connected with negative feelings such as jealousy, disgust, fear or repulsion. According to him, sexuality and sex give way to some especially strong and offensive swearwords, because we tend to connect them with derogation (e.g. rape. incest, exploitation) rather than pleasure. However, he also points out that our Western society is getting more relaxed about swearwords related to sex, while swearing connected with race is still a big taboo. But that would go more into abuse, and that's not what I want to write about. Swearing is something entirely different.

Swearwords get most of their power from reaction. We are taught from a very young age that certain words are offensive and not socially acceptable, even though we might not understand why exactly when we're young. But the first time we say a swearword in front of our parents for example, we get a very strong emotional response (and usually not a very nice one), so subconsciously we link the offensive word to strong emotions. Let me relate a little personal story here: When I was very young (around 8 I think), my cousin who is 3 years older than me taught me the phrase 'fuck you' (well, in German of course, which is fick dich). I had no idea what it meant - and to be honest, I think neither did my cousin - but we had great fun experimenting with that phrase, finding different things people could fuck, at one point shouting 'fuck your bike' after a girl. As I said, I had no idea. Later that day my cousin and I were in my room, still having fun with that versatile phrase, when my mum came in. I got up, ran over to her and gleefully told her to go fuck herself.
She reacted wonderfully, though. She took me aside and calmly explained to me what the phrase meant and why I must not say it to people. I felt very grown-up and serious about it. My cousin got a right shitstorm later.

Why do we swear, though? What was the motivation behind the first swearing? Well, one answer is that we use swearing to channel aggression. We swear at people instead of hitting or biting them like animals do. So swearing actually gives us an evolutionary advantage, if you want to look at it that way. If we would hit or bite someone every time we're angry with them, we probably wouldn't go very far. But there's another, very interesting point: Swearing also seems to be linked to feeling pain. In his documentary, Stephen Fry and Brian Blessed took part in an experiment to prove exactly this: Each of them had to put one hand into a tank of ice cold water. The first time round they weren't allowed to swear at all, but the second time they were allowed to use a swearword. Amazingly, the swearing helped against the pain and Fry managed to keep his hand in nearly twice as long as before. The professor conducting the experiment (I forgot his name) explained it thusly: When we swear aloud, we shock ourselves and the released adrenalin numbs the pain. As Brian Blessed is well-known for swearing a lot, the effect didn't set in with him, because he was so used to swearing it lost its shocking effect for him.

I think it is not just the shock effect that makes swearwords so strong, it's also their sound. They are mostly rather short, and sound very harsh. 'Fuck' has that great 'ffff' sound and the hard consonant ending after a short vowel. 'Cunt' is even harsher, with a hard consonant at the beginning and at the end. That would explain why we find 'shit' more effective than 'poo' - the latter just sounds too nice with its long open vowel ending, it doesn't sound as disgusting. Plus, those words - especially fuck - are extremely versatile.

And at the end a small link between swearing and comedy, again: Adding a swearword into a sentence - called jab-line - makes the line funnier, because it surprises the audience. And you can create such wonderful sentences with them.

Franz Kafka's It's A Wonderful Life

"As Gregor Samsa awoke one morning from uneasy dreams he found himself transformed in his bed into a.... WHAT?"

Ever wondered how Franz Kafka came to write his famous Metamorphosis? This really, really brilliant short film follows his struggles to come up with a good idea for his new story. It's dark, odd and funny. Richard E. Grant is brilliant as Kafka and the film was written & directed by no other than Peter Capaldi, who by the way won an Oscar for it in 1995.
Not historically accurate, but a great piece of work!

 

This sketch made me learn the poem by heart & introduced me to Wordsworth.

The Language of Comedy (Swearing & The Thick Of It extended)

Peter Capaldi says it as it is

The Art of Swearing & The Thick Of It

WARNING: This post will contain strong language. Just so you know.

In an earlier post here, I mentioned the beauty of swearwords and said that the two people I love hearing swearing most are Terry Hall and Stephen Fry. Let me correct that: It's actually Peter Capaldi as Malcolm Tucker in Armando Ianucci's brilliant The Thick Of It (and the spin-off film In The Loop). The characters in this series are constantly swearing, employing rude similes and extremely visual metaphors – but no-one more so than Malcolm Tucker, the undisputed star of the show. I think it helps that Peter Capaldi is Scottish, it just makes it sound even better (same goes for his side kick Jamie aka 'the crossest man in Scotland').
I must say I only recently got into the series, because I always thought it's one of those programmes that use insults and foul language to get cheap laughs – how wrong I was! I began to be more interested in it when it was mentioned on Fry's Planet Word (and you should know me by know – if Stephen Fry approves, it's worth checking out!). When I learned that the shows has its own swearing consultant (how cool is that?!) and actually contributed a new word to the dictionary, I thought it would be worth giving it a try. Of course there is a lot (and I mean a lot) of swearing, especially the wonderfully versatile fuck, but it's not just mindless abuse – it's actually art! The language is extremely creative, incredibly well-paced and some of the similes and metaphors or nicknames are simply hilarious! It's not just the swearing though, there sometimes are dialogues that are brilliant on their own, completely without swearing – but the foul language just adds that extra bit of brilliance.
I do hesistate to put a youtube compilation on here, because some of the figures of speech lose their impact when taken out of context and put together into an endless stream of abuse and fucks. However, clickhere for some very creative examples (all Malcolm Tucker, though the other characters have great lines too, he usually gets the best ones). And one that works all the time, Tucker's Law:

Just listen to the rhythm of that, just stunning! It all comes together, the two most powerful swearwords (more on those in my next post), a great pace and rhythm and a gorgeous Scottish accent! 
Though sometimes, the build up is very important, just to let that little bomb explode skillfully at the end:

These are only a few examples, they're even funnier in the context of the show & when you hear the delivery.
So if you're okay with swearing, I do implore you: Go and watch it!


I'll be analysing the beauty of swearing more closely in my next post.
Until then,
Fuckety- bye

Wordplay

There are many ways in which you can manipulate words and play with them, some more elaborate and/ or complicated than others. Some are simply ingenious. Here are some of my favourites:


Lipogram
means writing a sentence or paragraph but omitting one letter or a group of letters of the alphabet. The most challenging here is of course trying to omit vowels, especially E, which is the most common letter in the English language. There is a variation to this called pangrammatic lipogram, where you have to use every letter of the alphabet except one. Example: The quick brown fox jumped over the lazy dog (includes all letters except S)
other examples:
Walter Abish's Alphabetical Africa – this one is amazing. The first chapter consists solely of words beginning with A. The second chapter also allows words beginning with B and so on, until in the 26^th chapter all words are permitted. In the next 26 chapters he reverses the process.


Gyles Brandreth – he has rewritten some of Shakespeare's works as lipograms! E.g. Hamlet without the letter I ('To be or not to be, that's the query')


Clerihew

after Edmund Clerihew Bentley, a four-line, sort-of biographical poem. It normally pokes fun at famous people, but without resorting to satire or abuse. The four lines of the poem are irregular in metre and length, the rhyme structure is AABB, the rhymes often forced. The first line of the poem always contains, and often consists solely of, the subject's name.

One of Bentley's best known clerihews is this:

“Sir Christopher Wren

Said, 'I am going to dine with some men.

If anyone calls

Say I am designing St. Paul's.'“

  but I also love this one, not by him:

"Did Descartes
Depart
With the thought
'Therefore I'm not'?"

 Palindrome 
the good old palindrome, a word / phrase/ sentence that reads the same forward and backward. Finding a single word palindrome is rather easy (e.g. noon, madam), but whole sentences that make at least some sense are much harder – well-known examples are 'Dammit, I'm mad' (a whole poem by Demetri Martin) , 'Step on no pets' (the second one even uses correct spacing) or ''Madam, I'm Adam'. The longest palindrome according to the Oxford English Dictionary is the onomatopoeic 'tattarrattat' which first appeared in James Joyce's Ulysses. There are also two whole palindromic novels (!): Satire: Veritas by David Stephens and Dr Awkward & Olson in Oslo by Lawrence Levine (no, I have not read them). 

Spoonerism can be deliberate or merely a slip of the tongue; it means swapping consonants, vowels or morphemes between two words, e.g. a 'smart fellow' becomes a 'fart smeller' (yes, hilarious example, I know) 

Anagram a classic. It means reassembling the letters in a word or phrase to construct a new one. Some great examples, found in Bill Bryson's Mother Tongue: 
 Mother In Law – Woman Hitler 
William Shakespeare – I am a weakish speller
 Funeral – real fun 

And here a brilliant Monty Python sketch that includes anagrams and spoonerism. I read somewhere that Eric Idle can actually speak in anagrams and backwards, which is pretty cool. They also performed this sketch when I went to see them at the O2 a few days ago (yes! Be jealous!)

quote of the day

"My reputation swept back home in drag"

 - 'The Width Of A Circle' by David Bowie (from The Man Who Sold The World)

Jane Austen House in Bath

I forgot to mention I went there a few weeks ago. Austen lived in Bath for about five years, not exactly in the house the exhibition is in, but in a very similar one a bit up the road. I can recommend it to people who don't know a lot about her biographical background. If you already do, there won't be much in it for you, as there is only a very basic introductory talk, about 10-15 minutes, which sort of outlines the major events in her life and focusses of course on the Bath years. After that you can walk around the house and read stuff about life and society in Regency Bath and a few details about Austen's life, with quotations from her letters, or have your photo taken wearing Regency costumes. The talk only deals with the books, but the last room of the exhibition is dedicated to the many film adaptations of Austen's novels and even features a letter from Emma Thompson, who sent a copy of her Golden Globe acceptance speech, which she delivered Jane Austen style.

So it is definitely worth checking out if you are new to Jane Austen, or have read her books but want to find out a bit more about the historical and biographical background. They've also got a lovely tea room upstairs, and if you're a student you can get in a bit cheaper.

Watch Emma Thompson's infamous acceptance speech:

Translations II

A few weeks ago I wrote a small piece on translations and the potential problems and / or shortcomings of translating prose or verse into another language. I found an extract that basically makes the same point but more elaborately and with a nice concrete example. It is rom G.K. Chesterton's book on Thomas Aquinas, chapter VI (The Approach To Thomism). He is talking about how St Thomas describes his basic and universal philosophic idea (it would be too complicated to go into that here, and I have to say I'm not sufficiently informed anyway) with the Latin word Ens:

“...anybody who can read Latin at all, however rudely, feels it to be the apt and fitting word (…) it ought to be a matter of logic (to understand St Thomas' concept); but it is also a matter of language.

Unfortunately there is no satisfying translation of the word Ens. The difficulty is rather verbal than logical, but it is practical. I mean that when the translator says in English 'being', we are aware of a rather different atmosphere. Atmosphere ought not to affect these absolutes of the intellect; but it does. The new psychologists, who are almost eagerly at war with reason, never tire of telling us that the very terms we use are coloured by our subconsciousness, with something we meant to exclude from our consciousness. And one need not be so idealistically irrational as a modern psychologist, in order to admit that the very shape and sound of words do make a difference, even in the baldest prose, as they do in the most beautiful poetry. We cannot prevent the imagination from remembering irrelevant associations even in the abstract sciences like mathematics (…) Now it unfortunately happens that the word 'being', as it comes to a modern Englishman, through modern associations, has a sort of hazy atmosphere that is not in the short and sharp Latin word. Perhaps it reminds him of fantastic professors in fiction, who wave their hands and say, 'Thus we mount to the ineffable heights of pure and radiant Being', or, worse still, of actual professors in real life who say, 'All Being is Becoming; and is but the evolution of Not-Being by the law of its Being' (…) Anyhow it has a wild and woolly sort of sound; as if only very vague people used it; as if it might mean all sorts of different things.

Now the Latin word Ens has a sound like the English word End. It is final and even abrupt; it is nothing except itself...“

Not everything in that passage is directly concerned with the problem of translation, but I left most of it in, because Chesterton's style is too nice to be interrupted. I have underlined what I think is the central point he is making here, and it sort of adds to the point I was making in the other post. Translating can cause problems on several levels: The sound and rhythm, but also the meaning, especially through associations as Chesterton notes. In my post, I focussed more on the form, the beauty that can get lost, but I also mentioned how translation can change the meaning of ideas or concepts, like Chesterton shows here with the Ens-Being example. And on a side note, I do agree with him that those two words do seem to describe completely different concepts, only by their sound.